This Capstone Report, prepared for Westside Consolidated School District (WCSD), examines formative assessment practices within a national context. Project Question 1: What are the current assessment practices in the Westside Consolidated School District and how do they align with research on effective formative assessment.
Contextual Analysis
WCSD is more socioeconomically diverse, with 60% of students qualifying for free or reduced price lunch. Overall, WCSD consists of a majority white population with a significant number of economically disadvantaged students.
Methods
Before the evaluation was carried out, a matrix was developed for evaluating the responses according to the evaluation criteria in the literature. A threat to the internal validity of the formative assessment reflection protocol is that teachers self-reported the data and may have inflated the veracity of their assessment practices.
Findings. Current Assessment Practices and
A Clear Message
Few schools have a formalized process for pre-assessment, so it is generally up to the teacher to develop an instrument capable of assessing baseline knowledge. While students come to teachers with test scores and information from the previous year, in the absence of a comprehensive pre-assessment, teachers can pre-assess at the beginning of each unit to establish a baseline of student knowledge. This teacher showed understanding of the use of pre-assessment and indicated that she uses it regularly in her practice.
We give the same test at the beginning of the year and at the end to show growth". As noted, teachers understand the need for pre-assessment, but it is not sufficiently embedded in their practice to contribute meaningfully to management education. Some teachers, especially at the middle and high schools, felt that change and re-teaching could limit the amount of material they could cover in the year.
No, I don't feel like they have it and I don't know how to fix that. This comment was illustrative of a sentiment shared by many teachers and a concern about the pace needed to teach sufficient content over the course of the year while ensuring student mastery. Evidence from collected documents, interviews, and the formative assessment reflection protocol suggests that a wide variety of assessments are used across the district. It is also useful to administer the same test in all classrooms at the same time to discover if one teacher is the only one.
Structure Without Content
In anticipation of meeting these higher standards, teachers have quickly adapted their practice to teach the Common Core as well as the existing Arkansas Framework, and many teachers and administrators in the system described difficulties in blending these two different curricula. We're in that transition in between, and we have some teachers who are afraid to let it go and are still using the frameworks.” Another added, "We're nervous because we don't know what the assessment looks like yet. We still have to be tested against the Arkansas standards, so we're still trying to get to the happy medium."
During this transition, to truly engage students as active participants in the learning process, it is necessary to share with them the objectives of each lesson or unit. Further articulation of alignment between goals and assessment can be found in the definition of shared standards of success between students and teachers. Elementary staff demonstrated the most consistent use of feedback and differentiation in the type of feedback provided to individual students.
Teachers also felt that reporting grades to parents in an online grade reporting system was evidence of sufficient feedback and that in many classrooms grades may be the only feedback students receive. Student engagement in the learning process is enhanced when students are able to assess the quality of their work or that of their peers (Wylie et al., 2012). Secondary teachers were the least likely to implement self-evaluation techniques, although they were somewhat more likely to give students set goals, sometimes in the form of individual conferences.
Limited Time
Findings. Assets and Obstacles to the Implementation of
Like many other organizations, WCSD has its own unique context and climate, and these elements must be considered when examining WCSD's formative assessment practices. The detailed examination of the interviews, survey responses, and AdvancEd accreditation evaluation contribute to a detailed portrait of WCSD. A tentative overriding factor relevant to WCSD is the small and rural nature of the district.
The specifics of how the small rural nature of WCSD affects all aspects of the district can be difficult to measure; However, a primary school teacher attempted to synthesize the uniqueness of the community and its impact on schools. The smaller the district, the smaller the class size, the more personal you can be with the parents and the students and I think that's a help." The sense of community and care deeply rooted in WCSD is one of the district's greatest assets and one that was repeatedly shared throughout the interviews.
Assets Community
Throughout the interviews, the sense of community and shared responsibility was evident and contributed to an overall collegiality among the staff. We know, not only do we know all our students, but we also know the other teachers." So it makes a big difference to know who's behind, who's on pace and who's ahead.” Strong sense of community in.
The benefit of this component is overarching and could potentially be heavily relied upon to help the district further improve its formative assessment processes. During the interviews, sentiments regarding district and school leaders' expectations regarding the use of various forms of formative assessment were evident. This expectation is clearly understood by the staff; However, how assessment should be implemented is less defined, resulting in inconsistent practices.
Not only do we know all our students, we know..the other teachers' students too.”. While there are some positive components to the district's current expectations, there are also some components that present challenges to increasing the effectiveness of formative assessment practices and ultimately improving levels of student achievement. The next steps involve incorporating practices of conducting and using formative assessment to drive learning into daily practices, conversations, and lessons across the district.
Obstacles Shifting Focus
Discussion
A benefit of WCSD's size is the sense of community and collegiality that develops between the teaching staff and the community. Time is an essential component in developing a professional community and weekly meetings are recommended to ensure team alignment (Hord, 2010). This is again an area in which the geographical proximity of schools, when combined with sufficient time, would allow discussion both within and between schools in order to develop a coherent continuum of learning.
Given the barriers that exist to implementing a comprehensive professional development program for all teachers, existing resources must be leveraged to maximize the benefits for all teachers. This, too, requires formalizing school and district leadership expectations and prioritizing resources to support the organization's shared goals. All of the discussion to date has revolved around the conditions that promote or limit the implementation of formative assessment, which leads directly to the quality of practices used in WCSD.
The continued use of qualitative feedback is an important prerequisite for other vital components of the formative assessment cycle. Regardless of the type of assessment provided, if adequate follow-up is not provided in accordance with learning objectives, teachers miss a key opportunity to engage students in their learning process. In addition to these relative ups and downs, there are some areas that fall somewhere in the m i d d l e , which are a b o u t h a l f o f t e a k h e r demonstrated use of practices and about the same amount not.
Recommendations
Through these partnerships and opportunities, WCSD's employees can gain knowledge of the new Common Core Standards, and deepen their knowledge and implementation of various formative assessment practices. Individual professional development should be focused around clearly defined district initiatives for improving formative assessment practices. Ideally, WCSD would collectively focus on a particular component of formative assessment and work to create consistently implemented practices across the district before moving on to the next component.
By incorporating these recommendations, WCSD can further improve existing formative assessment practices and use technology effectively to promote instructional practices throughout the district. This book provides a comprehensive look at the most current research and practice on formative assessment. It is also one of the primary sources used in the development of the formative assessment reflection protocol implemented in this research.
Evaluation of formative assessment practices should be an ongoing process in which teachers continually monitor student needs and the tools used to uncover evidence of student learning. As teachers engage in book studies, administrators must use a "big picture" framework for formative assessment. This tool is not meant to be prescriptive, but rather a checklist that teachers and teams can use to ensure that an assessment instrument contains elements from setting a clear learning objective to using the results for goal-setting activities found in effective formative assessment practices.
Available Online Assessment Technology
Support teachers in utilizing the Formative Assessment
Teachers use the Self-Reflection Tool in conjunction with PLCs to evaluate formative assessments used in classrooms. Continue to follow the Data Wise cycle of inquiry to guide teacher discussions around the use of formative assessment to guide instruction.
Adjust existing schedule to allow for vertical
Conclusion
The Obama administration is setting the bar high for flexibility from No Child Left Behind to advance equity and support reform.
Appendices
Thank you for taking a moment to answer the following questions about your use of formative assessment. Think of an example of formative assessment you used this year and be as candid as possible to ensure we can get an accurate picture of Westside practices.
Response
Written Response
Performance Assessment
Personal
Communication
